


A source of little visible delight

by MildredMost



Category: Historical RPF
Genre: M/M, Nonnies Made Me Do It, Orgasm Delay/Denial, RPF, Ties & Cravats
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-06-03
Updated: 2019-06-03
Packaged: 2020-04-07 05:26:36
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,809
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19078381
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/MildredMost/pseuds/MildredMost
Summary: Branwell Bronte gets manhandled.





	A source of little visible delight

Keeper the terrier was toasting himself on the hearth rug. Anne was sprawled next to him, her feet propped on the fender. Charlotte was perched on a stool reading a thrilling bit from her latest Angrian story, while Emily mended stockings in the large armchair.

"Stock he disdained, and waistcoat: the most fastidious lady might have beheld with admiration that muscular chest and neck bristled with heroic hair."

"Charlotte!" said Anne, shocked but laughing. "He is well-nigh naked!"

"Shh, Anne. Go on, Charlotte," said Emily.

"Oh I haven't gone beyond that yet. But he and Sir William will discuss the uprising and then there is a terrible skirmish in the streets of Zamorna."

"Will Sir William also disdain any clothes, while they discuss it?" said Anne, stretching her legs towards the fire.

"Anne you will set your stockings alight if you keep that up," said Charlotte.

"Tabby isn’t here to scold me," Anne said. "Speaking of Tabby, shall I get her? She wanted us to read her the letter from Ellen about the exhibition in Liverpool. She said she'd be fairly thrilled to hear about it.”

"Oh, don't call her, she will just find something I haven't done," said Emily. "It is so rare we are all together."

"All but Branwell," Anne said.

"He is with Joseph Bentley Leyland," said Charlotte, her eyes daring them to comment.

Emily dared.

"Branwell's Joseph. There is something devilish about him," Emily said. She laughed. "He is so wild and darkly handsome."

"Branwell only likes him because he pays his debts for him and then buys him enough porter to stupify himself," Charlotte said.

"It cannot just be that," said Emily. "They are very intimate."

"It is good for Branwell, in a way, that he has a friend again after William died last year," Anne said.

"Oh it is all play-acting with him. Ever the broken-hearted poet. I'm sure he had Emily and father dancing attendance on him as he grieved. I would not have been fooled by it."

"You are being cruel and I know why," said Emily, animatedly and with little tact. She could not bear it when Charlotte was bitter like this about Branwell. "Branwell frightens you, because you see yourself in him."

"Well there you are wrong," said Charlotte, throwing down the poker and making Keeper jump. "It is the squandering of his talent I cannot bear. I had such aspirations for him, and certainly he was father's pride and hope! But what of that now? He will drink it all away."

"I think," said Anne, in her best school-teacher manner, "that we should talk of other things."

Charlotte returned to scribbling furiously, and her sisters fell silent. The logs crackled. Keeper snored.

Presently there were noises outside the Parsonage; two people talking loudly and some scuffling. Keeper raised his head and growled. Charlotte and Emily snapped upright. Anne looked at them both and pressed a finger to her lips.

"You are drunk as a lord tonight, Branwell," said a man's voice, as the voices passed beneath the window.

"Leave me be, Joseph," laughed their brother’s voice, his words ever so slightly slurred. They heard the slosh of a bottle being upturned and drunk from. "Have some of this. It's fine stuff. Put hairs on your chest, so the innkeeper told me."

"You know very well I have hairs on my chest already," Joseph said, but they heard him take the bottle and drink too.

"Do you? I don't remember. Now finish that up and come inside, I want to show you that letter and get warm by the fire.”

Anne gasped a little.

"We shouldn’t stay," she whispered.

“Oh!” said Charlotte, “Am I never to have some peace to write! It is too bad.”

"Can we turn Joseph off?" Emily said.

“I’d like to see you try it. Oh, they will drink and swear and brag, and Branwell shall run away at the mouth about his letter from Coleridge till Joseph longs to smother him with it,” said Charlotte, sweeping her papers together and cramming them into a blotter.

The front door banged open now, and there was a commotion and clatter as if someone had fallen over the boot scraper. There were some shouts of laughter and cries of "Help me up, by God!"

“Come, quickly,” Anne said. They left the room and pattered up-stairs to the bedrooms, Keeper at their heels.

Xxx

Joseph followed his merry friend into the Parsonage, very glad that all of his family seemed to be abed. No strange, quiet girls observing him from corners with eyes that seemed to penetrate his very soul. Or so it felt.

They advanced down the hallway, Branwell chattering excitedly almost without stopping.

"Oh it is good to be with old friends who know me as I truly am! How devilishly bored I am at Thorpe Green. My employers think that I am a calm, sober, patient, virtuous gentleman philosopher,” Branwell spat every word. “ I dress in black and smile like a saint. If they but knew my true nature; well! They little think the devil is so near them."

"Yes Bran, you are Mephistopheles himself," said Joseph, smiling a little at the small red-haired man before him who could not look less like a demon. How he liked to posture.

"I am in earnest," Branwell said. "Oh this world of falsehood and hypocrisy! I tell you my friend, I live for pleasure, poetry and porter, and death and damnation to the rest."

Taking a dramatic glug of gin, he wiped a hand across his mouth. Joseph said nothing, but took the bottle from him when it was offered.

"I must tell you about the night I spent in the Black Bull two weeks since. Oh, the laughs we had. That prick Grundy was in an infernal mood..." Branwell launched into another of his interminable stories about whisky toddies and barmaids and waking up in nothing but his boots holding a corkscrew.

"Branwell, enough," Joseph said at last, but not unkindly. "I know what a damnable creature you are without you telling me these tall tales. You do not need to do anything to impress me, you know."

"Tell me you are not becoming reformed too," said Branwell, shrugging off his coat and slinging it over the armchair.

Joseph shook his head slightly. "No. I am too far gone for that." He removed his coat, and ran a hand through his hair. Branwell had turned away from him and was rummaging in the writing desk for something.

"Now Joseph I know you think this letter from Coleridge is just one of my stretchers but by my oath it is as true as I'm standing here. I put it in Charlotte's desk here for safekeeping but...oh, I cannot find it..." Joseph watched for a moment, then strode across the room. He took Branwell's arm and spun him round to face him. "Branwell. I did not come here to read your letter."

Branwell was silenced at last.

"You know why I have come. After our confessions last night, how can you not?"

Branwell swallowed. "Perhaps we should forget last night. We had not seen each other in a while and should not have behaved as we did."

He tried to turn back to the desk, but Joseph held him still.

"And yet you came drinking with me again. After our confessions, and your responses. After I  
told you...how you corrupt my every thought. I believe you have known that though, for as long as I have felt it."

Joseph reached up a hand, gently, and ran his thumb across Branwell’s face. He brushed the pad of his thumb across Branwell’s lips, watching as they opened. Branwell's expression softened as he looked at his friend, then he closed his eyes resignedly.

"Branwell. Look at me," Joseph said.

Branwell opened his eyes again. Sighed. "Oh, the devil with you," he said, putting his hand on the back of Joseph's neck, pulling him down for a kiss.

Joseph kissed back hard. He pushed Branwell backwards against the desk, and trapped him against it, holding him still. Branwell moaned then, and Joseph answered by pushing his tongue between Branwell's parted lips.

Branwell pulled back for a moment.

"We should," he said breathlessly, "We should s-stop now...this is..."

“Stop? This from the devil?” Joseph breathed into Branwell’s neck, pushing his body against him. “From a man who only lives for pleasure?”

He stroked his hand across Branwell's crotch and Branwell seemed to melt. But he tried one more protest.

"We shouldn't...not here. My sisters..."

"Oh, your sisters. Perhaps they will pray for us. Never mind them. Mind me instead."

He lowered his head and kissed Branwell again, deep and open mouthed, stroking and cupping Branwell's cock through the fabric of his trousers. Branwell kissed back, his protests forgotten.

"All that talk in your letter last week," Joseph continued, beginning to unbutton Branwell's trousers with quick twists of his fingers, 'Of pretty little eighteen year olds with their big blue eyes. You knew that would enrage me, didn't you? You must have known.”

"I didn't..."

"Well you'll suffer for it now, Bran," Joseph smiled dangerously, pulling Branwell's fall completely open and beginning on his underclothes. "I'm going to make you wish you'd never mentioned her at all."

He tore Branwell's underclothes open then and slid his hand around Branwell's cock, almost as familiar as his own after all these months of desperate trysts and fumblings. Branwell gave a cry and pushed upwards against him, holding tightly to the edge of the desk as Joseph tightened his grip and began to stroke.

"And what was it you said last night," Joseph said, slowing his strokes now as he used his free hand to unwind Branwell's cravat, "What was it you wanted me to do?"

"I was drunk. I-I don't remember," said Branwell, arching into Joseph’s hand. "Please, Joe."

"Yes - you were begging me then too. Please Joe, touch me. Please Joe, I want your mouth on me. Hold me down. I could not oblige last night, but I mean to now."

Joseph pulled the unwound cravat from Branwell's neck. With deft movements he used it to pin Branwell's wrists behind his back. Branwell threw his head back, panting but not struggling, his expression a mixture of fear and anticipation.

"You asked me to tie you," Joseph said. Branwell flushed and nodded.

"And to touch you." Branwell bit his lip and nodded again.

Joseph looked at him, standing close but not touching, and smiled slowly. Branwell followed him with his eyes, his chest hitching with each breath.

"What do you mean to do to me?"

Joseph just watched, waited.

"Please Joe." Branwell's trousers were barely clinging to his hips, his hard cock standing out from them. "Oh...God save me..."

"Always the parson's son. _I_ will save you. God will not have the satisfaction that I have,” said Joseph. He held Branwell by the hips and forced him back against the desk again. "And I know better what you want."

Joseph knelt then and licked the length of Branwell’s cock, setting Branwell off straining against his ties. Joseph took him into his mouth and began to suck and Branwell was lost.

Joseph teased his friend, speeding up, slowing, stopping to lick his length and swirl his tongue around the head of his cock, or taking his mouth away entirely and merely brushing Branwell with his thumb as he kissed the pale skin of Branwell’s stomach. Branwell was delirious with want, being brought to the edge but not allowed release.

"Joe," he begged. "Let me. Oh, let me..."

Joseph pulled his mouth away from Branwell and smiled slowly.

"But Branwell, I don't think you're sorry, are you?"

"Sorry?"

"That letter, you brute. "fair-faced, blue-eyed, dark-haired, sweet eighteen."" Joseph stood then, tugging Branwell's head back so Branwell looked up at him. "You knew what that would do to me. I should have the heart out of your body for it, confound you."

"You can break my head for it later Joe, but please, please..." Branwell said, trying in vain to push himself against Joseph. "For God's sake, don't torment me now."

"What do you want?"

"I...just. Anything."

"Anything?" Joseph teased, taking Branwell's cock lightly in his hand. The light touch seemed to torment Branwell more than not being touched at all.

"Joe I...damn you."

Joseph tightened his grip, starting to bring Branwell off with steady strokes.

“Oh, can I...”

"Not yet. Hold it Branwell."

"I...I cannot," Branwell said between gasps. "I'm so..."

"Then I shall hold you like this so you cannot. See how that works?"

Branwell almost sobbed as Joseph gripped the base of his cock.

"Damn you Joe. Please."

Joseph answered by changing his grip and beginning his slow, hard stroking again. And stopped. And began again. Branwell could no longer plead his case, he was too far gone for that, helpless under Joseph's hands. His head dropped forward onto Joseph's shoulder as Joseph toyed with him relentlessly. Joseph took pity at last and forcing Branwell's head up with a finger under his chin, he kissed him one more time.

"Now, but look at me when you do," Joseph said.

With a struggle, Branwell raised his eyes to Joseph's as Joseph's hand moved fast and relentless on him. Shaking, he gave a long low moan, thrust upwards hard and began to spend over Joseph's fist, bucking with the strength of his release. His head fell back, neck exposed, a sheen of sweat in the hollow of his throat.

"My God Branwell," Joseph said, staring down at him. "You are too much. When you look like  
that I..."

"Untie me, confound you," said Branwell, trembling still from his release. Joseph yanked the ties from Branwell's wrists and Branwell reached for him then, pushing his hand inside Joseph's waistband, tearing at his buttons. He wrapped his hand around Joseph's hard cock, stroking him, kissing him through his moans.

"I always think of doing this," Branwell said, between breathless kisses, "when I look across the table at the Black Bull. When you're laughing with someone who isn't me. When - damn and blast you - you put an arm around Heaton or Anderson. I want to march over and show you..." His hand was moving fast on Joseph's cock now, relentless. "I want to make your face do what it is doing now. I love it when I can make you lose your reason."

Joseph feeling himself close, braced one hand against the desk, the other on Branwell's shoulder. He thrust himself rapidly against Branwell’s hand, crying out.

He leant forward until their foreheads met.

"Well," said Branwell after a moment. "That was diverting. I feel almost sober."

"Shocking. That must be corrected at once," said Joseph, buttoning himself up and helping Branwell do the same.

"Do you think the fellows at the tavern will be wondering why we came away?" said Branwell. "We did not tell anyone good-bye and Grundy can be a dog in the manger over your company."

"No, the were fairly far gone by then," said Joseph.

"We should be careful. I mean if we were to. Again."

"Of course we will again. I thought perhaps at last you had accepted that," Joseph said.

Branwell looked at Joseph hopelessly. “In truth I keep waiting for it to pass. I...I have not been able to stop thinking of you these past months. But it surely cannot last. There is no future in it."

Joseph made an exasperated sound and turned away from Branwell momentarily to compose himself before turning back again.

"Branwell, for all your brains, you truly are thickheaded. You think love is the stuff you write in your plays with your sisters," he said. "All storms and dramatics and swooning. It is not that."

Branwell was utterly silent, watching Joseph’s face.

"This passion of ours is not a passing thing. You have known it as well as I, though we never said it.”

“We said it last night, didn’t we,” Branwell said, and sat down by the fire as though exhausted.

“I thought we were to forget all that,” Joseph said, a little bitterly.

"It seems I cannot," Branwell said. “But I cannot see a future with or without you in it, and I scarce know what to do about it.”

Joseph sat down on the hearthrug and pulled the bottle of gin towards them both. Branwell gestured to him and he moved to lean against his knees.

“There is very little to be done,” he admitted. “We can only be truthful to each other and to ourselves. Perhaps there is a solution we cannot imagine. But until then…” He lifted the bottle and Branwell took it.

“Oblivion,” Branwell said with a smile that didn’t reach his eyes.


End file.
